'DISCOVERIES IN THE RUINS OF NINEVEH AND BABYLON; WITH TRAVELS IN ARMENIA, KURDISTAN AND THE DESERT.'

by Austen Henry Layard

1983, facsimile from the original 1853 edition. Faux-leather boards, red title panel with gilt titles and decorations on spine. All gilt edges. Fold-out illustration at front and several others throughout, large fold-out map at the end, marbled endpapers. Nine wood-cut illustrations. Sir Austen Henry Layard GCB PC (5 March 1817 – 5 July 1894) was an English traveler, archaeologist, cuneiformist, art historian, draughtsman, collector, politician and diplomat. He is best known as the excavator of Nimrud and of Nineveh, where he uncovered a large proportion of the Assyrian palace reliefs known, and in 1851 the library of Ashurbanipal. (Wikipedia) Layard's excavations provided important evidence about ancient Mesopotamia, particularly about the Assyrian civilisation, and his books - part travel writing, part specialized archaeological studies - are beautifully evocative. First published in 1853, this two-volume study follows the earlier Nineveh and its Remains (1849). It describes Layard's second expedition to the Near East, in 1845, which led to the identification of Kouyunjik as the great Assyrian capital Nineveh. In this richly illustrated book, Layard focuses on the description and interpretation of ruins, as he tells of the discovery of the lost palace of the Assyrian king Sennacherib (eighth century BCE) in northern Iraq.

Genres: History, Nonfiction

Hardcover

First published January 1, 1853

About the author

Sir Austen Henry Layard was an English Assyriologist, traveller, cuneiformist, art historian, draughtsman, collector, politician and diplomat. He was born to a mostly English family in Paris and largely raised in Italy. He is best known as the excavator of Nimrud and of Nineveh, where he uncovered a large proportion of the Assyrian palace reliefs known, and in 1851 the library of Ashurbanipal. Most of his finds are now in the British Museum. He made a large amount of money from his best-selling accounts of his excavations.
He had a political career between 1852, when he was elected as a Member of Parliament, and 1869, holding various junior ministerial positions. He was then made ambassador to Madrid, then Constantinople, living much of the time in a palazzo he bought in Venice. During this period he built up a significant collection of paintings, which due to a legal loophole he had as a diplomat, he was able to extricate from Venice and bequeath to the National Gallery (as the Layard Bequest) and other British museums.

Reviews

[Jonathan]

Reading this book one is struck with an eerie feeling. You can't turn on the news without hearing about Iraq...ISIS...the fall of Mosul...the defilement of the tomb of the prophet Jonah.

Layard spun a fascinating travelogue of his journey through the Ottoman Empire, from Anitolia, through Armenia, Kurdistan, Mesopotamia to the edges of the Syrian Desert. His journey across the deserts, the Tigris and Euphrates, up to Van, along the Persian frontier - at a time when that was a rare thing for a European - is amazing. He meets bedouins, sedentary Arabs, Yezidi, Nestorian and Chaldean Christians, Jews and a few other communities in various states of prosperity or wretchedness. He is sympathetic to some, critical of others but even handed to most. He never let's practicality drag him into relativistic morality. He identifies faults and good character of Muslim and Christian alike. He wears the hat of an ethnographer for most of the book. I decided to read this for the descriptions of the excavations - but the glimpse into the world of 1850s Mesopotamia (Iraq didn't exist yet) is the real take away from the read.


I am grateful that he was able to secure a small part of the worlds heritage - the base reliefs and other antiquities of Nineveh - from the hammer blows of the current insane iconoclasts sweeping through that region. And he beat them by 160 years!

[Robert]

High adventure, when The British Empire was at its height and archeology was getting serious.

[Joel]

Old archaeology book, not for the faint of heart. I enjoyed the first 200 pages, as he was traveling from the Black Sea coast down to Basra through Western Armenia and Yezidi villages.